Water treatment - made reasonably simple

EskiBrew · Oct 23, 2009

For some months now we have been working on a simple water treatment calculator. I say simple because that is what we are aiming for - you enter some details about your water from your water report and decide what style of beer you want to make and it will give you suggestions for how to treat the water.

Firstly though, water treatment will not help you to make good beer. If you already make good beer then it should help you to make better beer.

It is aimed a non-chemists - if you think it is too simple, there are others on the web you can use.

I have enabled it tonight in beta trial - click on the Calculators button in the header and then you will see it in the Quick Links near the top of the page.

Anyway, have a play and leave feedback if you wish. :thumb:

Wez · Oct 23, 2009

Well done EB, hats off to you. Must have taken loads of time, i'm sure it will be well recieved by the forum!

Check it out guys :clap:

EskiBrew · Oct 23, 2009

Forgot to say: The values you enter are stored in a cookie on your local machine so you don't have to dig out your water report every time you want to use it. You may need to delete your local cookies before that will work to get rid of the cookie in your browser cache. :roll:

corby_brewer · Oct 23, 2009

well done EB thats going to come in very handy

Wez · Oct 23, 2009

I love cookies :thumb:

tubby_shaw · Oct 24, 2009

Well done EB :thumb:
Another great piece of work

Aleman · Oct 24, 2009

Nice one EB :thumb: Good to see you finally made it live . . . . I can include it in the CBA Article and Fact sheet now :lol:

EskiBrew · Oct 24, 2009

Aleman said:
I can include it in the CBA Article and Fact sheet now :lol:

Oops - didn't realise I was holding things up

Vossy1 · Oct 29, 2009

Great addition to the forum EB, thank you :clap:

markp · Oct 29, 2009

:clap: Fantastic!

Aleman will be pleased I don't have to hound him for water calculations now :lol:

ano · Oct 29, 2009

Excellent, although some typos I spotted:

"Calcium is generally beneficial to beer as it lower the mash pH"

"Unfortuantely not all companies are so helpful"

leondz · Oct 30, 2009

I was so excited by this that I had to share. After mailing back and forth with the DWI (Drinking Water Inspectorate, part of DEFRA) a nice civil service chap pointed me to this page for anyone with Yorkshire Water http://www.yorkshirewater.com/extra-services/in-your-area.aspx. If they supply you, you can just put in your postcode, and all the figures needed (apart from alkalinity, but you can estimate a maximum CaCO3 alkalinity from "total hardness mg/L" minus "calcium mg/L" - probably skewed by molar weights, and that there may be other calcium around - anyone care to comment?). Tada! Happy bunny. Now to measure out 0.00001g gypsum

Where's a good place for treatment salts?

EskiBrew · Oct 30, 2009

ano said:
Excellent, although some typos I spotted:

"Calcium is generally beneficial to beer as it lower the mash pH"

"Unfortuantely not all companies are so helpful"

Thanks ano, well spotted :thumb: now sorted : cheers:

EccentricDyslexic · Apr 24, 2010

Wot a smashin' calculator! :party: Ive been strugling with Graham Wheelers water treatment calc over on Jims forum, its a bit complicated but good im sure for more advanced brewers. It'd be fab if you could add maybe an 'advanced treatment' tab or button where you could adjust the sulphate/chloride ratios to favor bitterness or mouthfeel.

But its fab as it is, i love the fact you can specify the mash volume and that it seperates the mash salt additions from the boil additions! :thumb:

Top Job chap!! : cheers:

Steve

Springer · Apr 24, 2010

Looks good

Not spotted this until ED revived the post.

Presumably a local water report is available from my Water supplier ?
S

EskiBrew · Apr 24, 2010

EccentricDyslexic said:
Wot a smashin' calculator! :party: Ive been strugling with Graham Wheelers water treatment calc over on Jims forum, its a bit complicated but good im sure for more advanced brewers. It'd be fab if you could add maybe an 'advanced treatment' tab or button where you could adjust the sulphate/chloride ratios to favor bitterness or mouthfeel.

Glad you like it Steve. If there is enough interest, I could do a more advanced version :thumb: - The idea here was to keep it as simply as possible because quite often people are scared off water treatment :roll:

Springer said:
Presumably a local water report is available from my Water supplier ?
S

Should be Springer. Not sure where you are but have a look at the links on the water treatment page - there are links to local water treatment authorities etc :thumb:

EccentricDyslexic · Apr 24, 2010

Springer, if you are in South staffs water area(I get Burton on Trent water!!) ignore thier water CaCo3 hardness/alkalinity figures even the lab gets it wrong!

Use thier figures for eveything else except that! Get a Salifert kit and do your own test!

Steve

Screwy · Apr 25, 2010

Nice easy to use calculator. CRS is not available here in Australia, any suggestions as to what I could use?

Cheers,

Screwy

Samarith · Jul 7, 2010

Nice work. Think I'll need to grab a water testing kit, cause the water report doesn't seem forthcoming carbonate levels. Unless Total Hardness (mg Ca/l) is one of the measurements.

Not ready for AG yet, still trying to decide between buying a complete rig (expensive), getting parts second hand (unpredictable) or trying to build my own (hazardous to health).

chrisp · Jul 23, 2010

I have just got my water quality report from South East Water - for the TN9 regiion if its of any use to others, I can send you an email.

However it does not appear to report on Alkalinity or Carbonate, giving no readings for CO3, HCO3 or CaCO3.

Therefore the calculator on the forum is not giving any recomendations for CRS or Chalk.

If I adjust the PH using Acid to 5.2 will this suffice, before adding Gypsum. salt, Epsom salts etc?

Also the tables give max, min and average readings, should I just plump for the average readings when calculating?

Thanks in advance

Chrisp

Water treatment - made reasonably simple

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